This chapter is from the book

This chapter is from the book

The SELECT Statement

NOTE: Sample Tables Required

From this point on, all lessons use the sample database tables. If you have yet to install these, please refer to Lesson 3, “Working with Oracle,” before proceeding.

As explained in Lesson 1, “Understanding SQL,” SQL statements are made up of plain English terms. These terms are called keywords, and every SQL statement is made up of one or more keywords. The SQL statement you’ll probably use most frequently is the SELECT statement. Its purpose is to retrieve information from one or more tables.

To use SELECT to retrieve table data, you must, at a minimum, specify two pieces of information—what you want to select, and from where you want to select it.